Descriptive  Catalogue 


THE  LIBRARY 


C^rfee  iAxni 


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Digitized  by  tine  Internet  Archive 

in  2007  witin  funding  from 

IVIicrosoft  Corporation 


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First  portrait  of  Lamb  engraved  {from  the  Maclise 
portrait)  in  America.    Philadelphia^  1835. 


Descriptive  Catalogue 


OF 


THE  LIBRARY 


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C^rfee  iAmS 


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NEW  YORK 

1897 


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CHARLES  LAMB'S  LIBRARY 

Charles  Lamb  at  his  death  bequeathed  to  his 
life -long  friend,  Edward  Moxon,  the  well- 
known  London  publisher,  his  curious  collec- 
tion of  books.  Moxon,  it  seems,  did  not  claim 
his  inheritance  until  after  the  death  of  Mary 
Lamb,  during  whose  last  long  illness  the  collec- 
tion of  books,  that  had  formed  the  solace  and 
delight  of  her  brother's  life,  had  met  with 
neglect  and  partial  dispersion,  chiefly  among 
his  friends.  After  her  death  Moxon  selected 
upwards  of  sixty  volumes  from  the  mass  as 
worthy  of  presentation  because  of  the  notes, 
etc.,  which  they  contained,  by  Lamb  and  his 
friends,  and  then  destroyed  the  remainder  of 
the  library.  Charles  Welford,  then  of  the  firm 
of  Bartlett  &  Welford,  an  intimate  friend  of 
Moxon's,  on  learning  that  the  collection  was  to 
be  sold  induced  Moxon  to  let  him  carry  off  the 
prize  to  America.  The  books  were  brought  to 
this  country  early  in  1848,  and  were  placed  on 
exhibition  in  the  store  of  Bartlett  &  Welford  at 
Nos.  2  and  4  Barclay  Street,  in  the  Astor 
House,  New  York.  Therethey  were  sold  piece- 
meal to  the  many  admirers  of  the  "  gentle  Elia," 
who  had  come  from  California  and  Oregon  as 
well  as  from  the  Eastern  States,  and  from 
Labrador  to  Mexico. 


710 


The  following  list  of  the  books,  with  notes 
of  the  marginalia  by  Lamb  and  his  friends,  was 
made  by  Charles  Welford*  and  was  first  printed 
in  The  Literary  World,  of  New  York,  with  an 
introduction  by  George  L.  Duyckinck: 

"  And  you,  my  midnight  darlings,  my  folios,  must  I 
part  with  the  intense  delight  of  having  you  (huge  arm- 
luls)  in  my  embrace  ;  must  knowledge  come  to  me,  if 
it  come  at  all,  by  some  awkward  experiment  of  intui- 
tion, and  no  longer  by  this  familiar  process  of  read- 
ing ?  "—Eli  A. 

(i)  Auli   Gelliiy    Noctes    Atticae,    Amst.,    Elz., 
1651.    24mo. 

"  This  book  was  bought  at  Mr.  J.  Home  Tooke's 
sale,  and  the  marginal  references  are  from  his  pen." — 
C.  L.'s  MS.  Note. 

(2)  Art  of  Living  in  London  {The),  A   Poem, 
Lond.,  1805.     i2mo. 

With  long  MS.  note  on  the  author,  Mr.  Wm.  Cooke. 
"  Goldsmith  gave  the  title  to  the  Art  and  revised  it  all, 
from  Jacky  Taylor,"  and  other  notes  and  remarks  MS. 

(3)  Bourne  {v.),  Poemata,  Latine,  partim  red- 
dita,  partim  scripta,  Lond.,  1750.     i2mo. 

With  several  Latin  poetical  extracts,  &c.,  on  the  fly 
leaves,  and  an  original  Latin  poem  of  six  lines,  "  Stium 
Cuique,^''  signed  C.  L.,  printed  in  Talfourd's  life  ;  "  the 
only  Latin  verse  I  have  made  for  40  years.  From 
thence  I  turned  to  V.  Bourne,  what  a  sweet,  unpretend- 
ing, pretty  mannered,  matterful  creature.  Bless  him  ! 
Latin  wasn't  good  enough  for  him,  why  wasn't  he  con- 
tent with  the  language  which  Gay  and  Prior  wrote  in." 
— Letter  to  Southey,  1815. 

(4)  Burney   {James),    Essay   on   the   Game    of 
Whist,  Lond.,  1821.     i2mo. 

"  Martin  Charles  Burney,  from  the  author "  (the 
M.  B.  of  Eha). 

(5)  Bacon's  {Lord),  ^Nor\iS,  Lond.,  1629.     Small 
4to. 

"  This  book  contains  Advancement  of  Learning  (ist 
edition,  1629),  and  Essays  by  Lord  Bacon." — MS.  Note. 

*  The  names  of  the  present  owners,  and  notes  of  the 
sale  of  Charles  W.  Frederickson's  library,  excepted. 


(6)  Cities  Great  Concern  {The),  A  Question  of 
Honor  and  Arms,  whether  Apprentiship  ex- 
tinguisheth  Gentry,  Lend.,  1674.     iSmo. 

"  This  treatise  was  written  by  John  Philpot,  Somer- 
set Herald,  died  1645,"  and  MS.  copy  of  title  page  on 
fly  leaf. 

(7)  Cieaveland  {J.),  Poems,  Orations,  and  Epis- 
tles, and  others  of  his  Genuine,  Incomparable 
Pieces,  ist  edit.,  Lond.,  1662.     i2mo. 

MS.  notice  of  the  author  from  Fuller's  Worthies. 

(8)  Cieaveland  (/.),  Poems,  Orations,  and  Epis- 
tles, and  others  of  his  Genuine,  Incomparable 
Pieces,  Lond.,  1668.     i2mo. 

MS.  notes,  and  additional  poems. 

(9)  Chaucer  {Jeffrey)^  The  Works  of  our  Ancient 
and  Learned  English  Poet,  and  Lidgate's 
Story  of  Thebes,  Speght's  Edition,  Lond., 
1598,  Black-Letter,  good  sound  copy.     Folio. 

MS.  notes  and  extracts  on  the  fly  leaves.  •'  I  have 
not  a  black-letter  book  amongst  mine,  old  Chaucer  ex- 
cepted."— Letter  to  Ai?tsworth,  1823. 

Bought  at  the  sale  of  Charles  W.  Frederickson's  li- 
brary, by  Charles  Scribner's  Sons,  for  $340. 

(10)  Ozf/^>'(y^.),  The  Works  of,  complete,  Lond., 
1693.     Folio. 

Three  folio  pages  of  additions  and  extracts,  marginal 
corrections,  MS. 

(11)  Dunciad {The),V2iX\ornm,  Lond.,  1729.  8vo. 
"  This  book  contains  the  Dunciad  as  at  first  written, 

with  Theobald  for  hero,  and  the  Art  ofjPolitics,  in  imi- 
tation of  Horace's  Ars  Poet." 

(12)  Dennis  {Mr.),  Original  Letters,  Familiar, 
Moral,  and  Critical,  by,  Lond.,  1726.     8vo. 

MS.  notes  and  additions. 

(13)  Drayton  {Michael),  The  Works  of,  contain- 
ing Poly  Olbion,  The  Barons' War,  England's 
Heroical  Epistles,  &c.,  i  vol.,  best  Edition, 
Lond.,  1748.     Large  folio. 

The  blank  leaves  are  literally  crowded  with  illustra- 
tive   extracts    from    Elizabethan    authors,    additional 


poems,  &c.,  including  the  whole  of  Skelton's  Philip 
Sparrow,  in  C.  Lamb's  "  most  clerkly"  hand  writing-. 

Bought  at  the  sale  of  Charles  W,  Frederickson's  li- 
brary by  Henry  B.  Smith,  the  librettist  and  composer, 
for  $250. 

(14)  Euripidis  Tragoediarum,  interp.  Lat., 
Oxonii,  1821.     8vo. 

"  C.  &  M.  Lamb  from  H.  F.  Gary,"  on  fly  leaf,  and  a 
few  marginal  corrections  of  the  text  in  C.  Lamb's  hand. 

(15)  Edwards  {Jonathan).     8vo. 

"  Edwards  on  Free  Will,  and  Priestley  on  Necessity, 
are  bound  together  in  this  volume." — MS.  Note. 

"  Priestley,  whom  I  sin  in  almost  adoring." — Letter 
to  Coleridge y  1797. 

(16)  Fulke  Greville  (Lord  Brooke),  Certain 
Learned  and  Elegant  Works  of,  written  in 
his  Youth,  and  Familiar  Exercise  with  Sir 
Philip  Sidney,  containing  Treatise  of  Humane 
Learning,  of  Warres,  Tragedie  of  Alaham, 
&c.,  &c.,  Lond.,  1633.     Small  folio. 

Long  extracts  relative  to  Ld.  Brooke,  marginal  cor- 
rections, and  note  on  the  suppression  of  one  of  his 
works. 

"  Whether  we  look  into  his  plays  or  his  most  pas- 
sionate love  poems,  we  find  all  frozen  and  |made  rigid 
with  intellect." — Dramatic  Specimens. 

(17)  Guardian  {The),  vol.  I,  Lond.,  1750.  i2mo. 
Vol.  2,  Lond.,  1734.     24mo. 

In  vol.  I  are  the  autographs,  "  John  Lamb,  1756," 
"  Charles  Lamb,"  in  a  child's  and  an  older  hand. 
This  set,  of  which  the  first  volume  had  belonged  to  his 
father,  and  the  second  was  picked  up  at  some  stall,  was 
Chas.  Lamb's  only  copy  of  "  The  Guardian." 

(18)  Hudibras,  in  Three  Parts,  with  Annota- 
tions, Lond.,  1726.     i2mo. 

On  the  Title,  "  Mr.  John  Lamb,"  and  various  mar- 
ginal corrections,  &c.,  in  his  son's  hand. 

{ici)  Hymens  Fraludia  ;  or.  Loves  Masterpiece, 
that  so  much  admired  Romance  of  Cleopatra, 
translated  by  R.  Loveday,  Lond.,  1698.    Folio. 
MS.  note  on  Title 


(20)  Jonson's  {Ben)  Works  complete  in  i  vol., 
Lond.,  1692.     Folio. 

The  blank  leaves,  margins,  &c.,  are  filled  with  ex- 
tracts from  the  old  Dramatists  and  early  English 
Writers,  with  additional  poems,  corrections  of  the  Text, 
&c.,  in  Charles  Lamb's  early  hand-writing,  forming  a 
most  curious  and  valuable  memento  of  his  favorite 
studies. 

Bought  at  the  sale  of  Charles  W.  Frederickson's  li- 
brary, by  Charles  Scribner's  Sons,  for  $375. 

(21)  Lucan's  Pharsalia;  or,  the  Civil  Wars  of 
Rome.  Englished  by  Thomas  May.  With 
continuation  to  the  death  of  Julius  Caesar, 
Lond.,  1635.     i2mo. 

Bears  marks  of  careful  reading  with  the  favorite 
passages  and  epithets  underscored, 

(22)  More  {Dr.  Henry),  Philosophical  Poems, 
Platonic  Song  of  the  Soul,  &c.,  Cambridge, 
1647.     i2mo. 

Fine  copy,  gilt  edges,  with  additional  Poems  and  few 
MS.  notes  and  corrections. 

Bought  at  the  sale  of  Charles  W.  Frederickson's  li- 
brary, by  George  D.  Smith,  for  $170. 

(23)  More  {Dr.  Henry),  Collection  of  the  Philo- 
sophical Writings  of,  Lond.,  1712.     Folio. 

On  fly  leaf,  "Mr.  Lamb,  20  Russell  street,  Covent 
Garden,  corner  of  Bow  street ;  in  the  autumn  of  this 
year  (1817)  he  and  his  sister  removed  to  lodgings  in 
Russell  street,  Covent  Garden,  delightfully  situated 
between  the  two  great  Theatres." — TalfourcVs  Life. 
See  Letter  to  Miss  Wordsworth,  Nov.  21, 1817,  in  do. 

(24)  More  {Dr.  Henry),  Explanation  of  the  Grand 
Mystery  of  Godliness,  Lond.,  1660.    Folio. 

"  Lamb,  Colebrook  Cottage,  end  of  Colebrook  Ter- 
race, left  hand,"  apparently  a  direction  for  the  delivery 
of  the  book,  written  inside.  [Coleridge,  who,  it  is  sup- 
posed, borrowed  this  volume  from  Lamb,  wrote  of 
this  work :  "  Contains  more  enlarged  and  elevating 
views  of  the  Christian  Dispensation  than  I  have  met 
with  in  any  other  single  volume ;  for  More  had  both 
the  Philosophical  and  Poetic  genius,  supported  by  im- 
mense erudition."] 

Now  in  the  collection  of  A.  GrowoU. 


(25)  Minor  Poets,  The  V^orks  of ,  vol.  i,  Lend., 
1749.     i2mo. 

*' Wentworth,  Lord  Roscommon,  Charles,  Earl  of 
Dorset,  Lord  Halifax,  Sir  Samuel  Garth."  MS.  note 
on  fly  leaf. 

(26)  Miscellanies,  in  one  vol.,  containing  five 
Tracts.     8vo. 

"  This  volume  contains  Antonio  :  a  Tragedy  by  Wm. 
Godwin  ;  Remorse :  a  Tragedy,  by  S.  T.C.;  Antiquity: 
a  Farce,  by  B(aron)  Field,"  &c.  MS.  list  of  Contents. 
Outside  the  cover  is  written,  "The  Remainder  of 
Christ's  Hospital,— return  the  volume  when  done  with. 
C.  L.  for  L.  Hunt,  Esq." 

Bought  at  the  sale  of  Charles  W.  Frederickson's  li- 
brary, by  Dodd,  Mead  &  Co.,  for  $300. 

(27)  Miscellany  Letters,  Collection  of,  selected 
out  of  Mist's  Weekly  Journal,  2  vols.,  Lond., 
1722.     8vo. 

On  the  cover  of  vol.  i  is  a  curious  list  of  Lamb's 
friends  and  acquaintances  with  their  address  as  "  God- 
win, 44  Gower  Place,  Fen  wick  "  (the  Bigod  of  Elia). 
"  Bond  street.  New  York,  and  Niagara,  Upper  Canada. 
Talfourd,  Moxon,"  &c. 

(28)  Newcastle  (Margaret  Cavendish,  Duchess 
of),  Works,  I  vol.,  Lond.,  1664.     Folio. 

"  This  volume  contains,  besides  Philosophical  Let- 
ters, The  Life  of  the  Duke  of  Newcastle,  by  the  Duch- 
ess," MS.  note.  Such  a  book,  for  instance,  as  the  Life 
of  the  Duke  of  Newcastle,  by  his  Duchess,— no  casket 
is  rich  enough,  no  casing  sufficiently  durable  to  honor 
and  keep  safe  such  a  jewel." — Elia. 

(29)  Newcastle  (Margaret  Cavendish,  Duchess 
of),  The  World's  Olio,  vsrritten  by  the  Thrice 
noble  historian  and  most  excellent  Princess, 
the  Duchess  of  Newcastle,  Lond.,  1671.    Folio. 

Bears  marks  of  careful  reading,  with  many  marginal 
MS.  notes,  comments,  &c. 

(30)  Newcastle  (Margaret  Cavendish,  Duchess 
of),  Nature's  Pictures,  drawn  by  Fancies 
Pencil,  the  Duchess  of  Newcastle, — her  Ex- 
cellency's Comical  Tales  in  Verse, — do.  do.  in 
Prose,  Lond.,  1656.     Folio. 

MS.  marginal  notes  and  corrections. 


(3i)  Osborne  {Francis)^  The  Works  of,  Memoirs 
of  Queen   Elizabeth   and  King   James,  &c., 
Lond.,  1689.     8vo. 
Few  MS.  references,  &c. 

(32)  Old  Plays,  A  Collection  of  rare  old  quarto 
Plays  ;  original  editions,  by  Nat.  Lee,  Shad- 
well,  Settle,  Mrs.  Bohn,  Tom  Durfey,  Crowne, 
&c.,  II  in  No.,  bound  in  i  vol.     410. 

MS.  list  of  contents. 

(33)  Old  Plays,  A  Collection  of  rare  old  quarto 
Plays  ;  original  editions,  by  Wycherley,  Dry- 
den,  Shadwell,  &c.,  with  Dryden's  Essay  on 
Dramatic  Poetry,  12  plays  in  i  vol.     4to. 

MS.  list  of  contents. 

Now  in  the  collection  of  John  Austin  Stevens,  Jr. 

(34)  Minor  Poets,  the  Works  of,  by  Vanbrugh, 
Farquhar,  Settle,  &c.,  and  curious  Tracts  by 
A.  Marvell,  C.  Cotton,  Motteux,  &c.  i  vol. 
4to. 

15  Tracts,  with  MS.  List  of  Contents. 
Now  in  the  Astor  Library. 

(35)  Minor  Poets,  the  Works  of,  contain  "The 
Duchess  of  Marly,"  by  John  Webster  (with 
numerous  marginal  corrections  ;  no  doubt  the 
copy  used  for  the  "Dramatic  Specimens"). 
The  Rehearsal  of  the  Duke  of  Buckingham, 
and  others  by  Etheredge,  Otway,  Wycherley, 
&c.     I  vol.     4to. 

MS.  Contents. 

Now  in  the  Astor  Library. 

(36)  Poetical  Tracts,  original  4to,  Editions, 
Mason's  English  Garden,  1772,  View  of  Cov- 
ent  Garden  Theatre,  curious  plate.  The  Thea- 
tres, ditto,  1772.     I  vol.     4to. 

MS.  List  of  Contents,  7  Tracts. 

(37)  Poetical  Tracts,  Poems  by  Charles  Lloyd, 
1795  ;    Lines   on   the    Fast  by    ditto,    1799 ; 


*' Charles  Lloyd  to  Charles: "  Coleridge's  France; 
Fears  in  Solitude,  &c. ;  Wordsworth's  De- 
scriptive Sketches,  &c.  All  original  editions. 
I  vol.     8vo. 

Full  of  corrections  and  variations  of  the  Text,  MS. 
Contents,  &c.,  by  C.  L. 

Now  in  the  collection  of  Charles  Eliot  Norton,  of 
Cambridge,  Mass. 

(38)  Prior  (M.),  Miscellaneous  Works  of ,  Lond., 
1740.     Svo. 

Numerous  MS.  Additions,  Extracts,  &c. 

(39)  Flays.     I  vol.     Svo. 

"  This  Book  contains  Wallenstein,  a  drama,  in  two 
parts,  translated  by  S.  T.  Coleridge,  from  Schiller, 
Plays  by  Joanna  Baillie."    MS.  notes. 

(40)  Philips  {Mrs.  Katharine),  The  Poems  of, 
the  Matchless  Orinda,  Lond.,  1678.     Folio. 

MS.  critical  note  and  emendations,  &c. 

(41)  Pelation  of  the  Fearful  Estate  of  Francis 
Spira.     i2mo. 

"  This  Book  was  written  by  one  Springer,  a  lawyer." 
MS.  note. 

".  .  .  Francis  Spira,  an  Advocate  of  Padua  Ann. 
1545,  that  being  desperate,  by  no  counsel  of  learned 
men  could  be  comforted  ;  he  felt  (as  he  said)  the  pains 
of  hell  in  his  soul,  in  all  other  things  he  discoursed 
aright,  but  in  this  most  mad." — Barton,  "Anatomy  of 
Melancholy."  Cure  of  Despair.  Pt.  III.  Sec.  IV.  p.  466. 

Now  in  the  Duyckinck  collection  in  the  Lenox  Li- 
brary. 

(42)  ReliqziicB  Wottoniance,  A  Collection  of  Lives, 
Letters,  Poems,  and  Characters  (by  Sir  Henry 
Wotton,  Dr.  Donne,  etc.),  edited  by  Izaacke 
Walton.     Best  edition.     Lond.,  1672.     Svo. 

Additional  Poems  by  Wotton,  and  few  notes,  MS. 

(43)  Richardson  {John),  Explanatory  Notes  and 
Remarks  on  Milton's  Paradise  Lost,  Lond., 
1734.     Svo. 

MS.  Notes  and  Extracts  on  the  Fly  Leaves. 


Engraved  by  G.  B.  Ellis. 


(44)  Review  of  the  Text  of  the  Twelve  Books  of 
Milton's  Paradise  Lost,  in  which  Dr.  Bentley's 
emendations  arc  considered,  Lond.,  1733. 
8vo. 

*♦  By  Dr.  Zachary  Pearce,  Bishop  of  Rochester." 
MS.  note. 

(45)  Shakspeare' s  Poems,  Venus  and  Adonis, 
Tarquinand  Lucrece,  &c.,  Lond.,  1714-    i2mo. 

With  several  pages  of  poetical  extracts,  poems 
ascribed  to  Shakspeare,  &c.,  and  frequent  marginal 
corrections  of  the  Text,  references,  &c.,  as  The  Amor- 
ous Epistle  of  Helen  to  Paris.  "  By  Thomas  Hey  wood, 
not  Sh,"  &c. 

Bought  at  the  sale  of  Charles  W.  Frederickson's  li- 
brary, by  Charles  Scribner's  Sons,  for  $210. 

(46)  Spectator  {The),  Vol.  9th  and  last.  4th 
edition,  rare.     Lond.,  1724.     i2mo. 

"By  Wm.  Bond,  associate  with  Aaron  Hill  in  the 
Plain  Dealer."    MS.  note. 

(47)  Swiff s  IVorks,  Vol.  5,  Dublin,  1759.    i2mo. 
Six  pages  of  Poetical  Extracts  on  the  fly  leaves, 

margin,  &c. 

(48)  Suckling  {Sir  John),  Fragmenta  Aurea.  A 
Collection  of  the  incomparable  pieces  of, 
Lond.,  1646.     8vo. 

MSS.  Extracts  from  Aubrey's  Lives,  Notes,  &c. 

Bought  at  the  sale  of  Charles  W.  Frederickson's  li- 
brary, by  Dodd,  Mead  &  Co.,  for  $270.  Portrait  by 
Marshall  is  missing  from  this  copy,  and  title-page  of 
"  The  Goblins  "  is  mutilated. 

(49)  Sewel {Wm.),  The  History  of  the  Rise  and 
Progress  of  the  people  called  Quakers,  Lond., 
1722.     Folio. 

MS.  reference,  &c.,  on  fly  leaf.  "  Reader,  if  you  are 
not  acquainted  with  it,  I  would  recommend  to  you 
above  all  Church  Narratives  to  read  Sewel's  History  of 
the  Quakers." — Elia. 

(50)  Tryon  { Thos.),  of  the  Knowledge  of  a  Man's 
Self.     8vo. 

Curious  MS.  Account  of  the  Author  of  this  singular 
work. 


(5i)   Tale  of  a    Tub  {The),   and    Battle  of  the 
Books,  Lond.,  1710.     8vo. 
Few  MS.  marginal  Notes. 

(52)  Tracts,  Miscellaneous,  The  Spleen,  by  Mr. 
Matthew  Green,  1737,  Dissertation  on  the 
Inlets  to  Human  Knowledge,  1739,  The  Un- 
certainty of  Physic,  1739,  &c.,  bound  in  i 
vol.     8vo. 

MS.  list  of  Contents. 

(53)  Tracts,  Miscellaneous,  11  curious  Tracts. 
The  Clouds  of  Aristophanes,  translated  by  J. 
White  and  10  others,  rare,  with  MS.  List  of 
Contents,     i  vol.     8vo. 

(54)  Tracts,  Miscellaneous,  Descriptive  Cata- 
logue of  Pictures  and  Poetical,  and  Historical 
Inventions,  by  William  Blake,  1809,  Lord 
Rochester's  Poems,  Lady  Winchelsea's  Po- 
ems, C.  Lamb's  Confessions  of  a  Drunkard, 
with  Corrections,  &c.,  Southey's  Wat  Tyler, 
&c.,  I  thick  vol.     i2mo. 

12  Tracts,  with  MS.  List  of  Contents. 

(55)  Waller  {Mr.),  The  Second  Part  of  his  Poems, 
containing  his  alterations  of  the  Maid's  Trag- 
edy, &c.,  Lond.,  1690.     8vo. 

Additional  Poems,  and  Notes  in  MS. 

BOOKS   ViTITH   NOTES   BY    S.    T.    COLERIDGE. 
"  Reader,  lend  thy  books,  but  let  it  be  to  such  a  one  as 
S.  T.  C,  he  will  return  them  (generally  anticipating  the 
time  appointed)  with  usury,  enriched  with  annotations 
tripling  their  value." — Elia. 

(56)  Buncle  {John)  the  Life  of.  By  Thomas 
Amory,  Lond.     8vo. 

With  very  curious  and  characteristic  introductory 
critical  Note  by  Coleridge,  and  marginal  corrections 
throughout. 

Bought  at  the  sale  of  Charles  W.  Frederickson's  li- 
brary, by  Dodd,  Mead  &  Co.,  for  $55. 

(57)  Donne  {^John)  Dean  of  St.  PauVs,  Poems  by, 
Lond.,  1669.     i2mo. 

The  blank  leaves  and  margins  full  of  curious  and 
10 


valuable  critical  and  illustrative  notes,  written  while 
reading  the  poems,  most  characteristic  of  Coleridge,  in- 
cluding an  original  Epigrammatic  Poem  by  him  &c., 
&c.,  at  the  end  is—*'  I  shall  die  soon,  my  dear  Charles 
Lamb,  and  then  you  will  not  be  vexed  that  I  have 
scribbled  your  book.    S.  T.  C,  2d  May,  1811." 

Bought  at  the  sale  of  Charles  W.  Frederickson's  li- 
brary, by  Dodd,  Mead  &  Co.,  for  $150. 

(58)  God's  Revenge  against  the  crying  and  ex- 
ecrable sin  of  Murder.  In  30  several  Tragi- 
cal Histories.  By  John  Reynolds.  Lond., 
1651.     Folio  cuts. 

With  very  long  and  curious  critical  and  metaphysi- 
cal notes  by  Coleridge,  characterising  the  book  of 
"honest  Murthereo-Maniacal  John  Reynolds."  in  an- 
other he  says,  "  O  what  a  beautiful  concordia  discord- 
antium  is  an  unthinking  good  man's  soul." 

Bought  at  the  sale  of  Charles  W.  Frederickson's  li- 
brary, by  Charles  Scribner's  Sons,  for  $110. 

(59)  History  {The)  of  Philip  de  Commines, 
Knight,  Lord  of  Argentan.  Translated. 
Lond.,  1674.     Folio. 

With  interesting  MS.  note  by  Charles  Lamb,  at  the 
commencement,  and  "  Memorabilia,"  by  Coleridge  at 
the  end,  on  the  free  towns  and  republics  of  the  Middle 
Ages,  &c. 

Bought  at  the  sale  of  Charles  W.  Frederickson's  li- 
brary, by  Charles  Scribner's  Sons,  for  $180. 

(60)  Petwin  {Rev.  John),  Letters  concerning  the 
Mind,  with  a  Sketch  of  Universal  Arithmetic, 
&c.     Lond.,  1750.     8vo. 

Full  of  the  most  curious  philosophic  and  abstruse 
notes  and  remarks  by  Coleridge,  written  in  Pencil  dur- 
ing his  perusal  of  the  book,  and  dated  Oxford,  October 
19,  1820. 
The   notes,  etc.,  by  Coleridge  mentioned  above,  are 

entirely  unpublished,  and  were  entirely  unknown  to  the 

Editors  of  his  Literary  Remams. 

The  collection  was  disposed  of  in  a  short 
time,  and  naturally  caused  considerable  discus- 
sion among  the  bookmen  of  this  country.  Tak- 
ing advantage  of  the  excitement,  John  Keese, 


of  Cooley,  Keese  &  Hill,  a  famous  firm  of  auc- 
tioneers at  191  Broadway,  corner  of  Dey  Street, 
New  York,  induced  a  number  of  purchasers  of 
these  volumes  to  offer  them  for  sale  at  auction. 
The  sale  took  place  on  the  evening  of  October 
21,  1848,  and  was  described  by  George  L. 
Duyckinck,  in  his  Literary  Worlds  of  November 
4,  1848,  as  follows  : 

"One  Saturday  evening  lately,  Mr.  Keese, 
of  the  house  of  Cooley,  Keese  &  Hill,  was  called 
upon  to  wield  his  hammer  over  a  lot  of  books 
extraordinary,  which  for  the  moment  put  to  rout 
the  usual  decorum  and  well-understood  proprie- 
ties of  the  auction-room.  Books  beyond  a  cer- 
tain investiture  of  raggedness  and  dilapidation, 
backs  without  covers,  mutilated  title-pages, 
and  missing  colophons,  on  ordinary  occasions, 
command  those  stimulating  fractions  of  ad- 
vance, a  penny  on  a  share,  for  instance,  which 
constitute  liveliness  on  the  exchange,  but  beget 
only  yawns  and  a  distaste  for  his  profession  in 
the  jolliest  of  auctioneers.  They  are  the  per- 
quisites of  the  basket  and  the  street  shelf;  they 
shrink  into  corners  of  out-of-the-way  streets, 
where  they  suffer  a  partial  exposure  to  the 
weather;  they  are  cheapened  from  threepence 
to  twopence,  and  their  last  destiny  is  probably 
to  be  boiled  in  soap-vats,  a  fate  of  which  their 
appearance  is  strikingly  suggestive.  They  are 
the  ill  odor  of  auction-rooms;  the  fly  in  the  oint- 
ment, the  flaw  in  the  vase,  the  stain  on  the  gar- 
ment of  the  happiest  of  all  possible  professions, 
as  illustrated  by  the  eloquence  of  a  Robbins  or 
the  wit  of  a  Keese.  Over  a  lot  of  the  shabbiest 
of  all  known  volumes  the  last-mentioned  auc- 
tioneer was  administering,  but  they  were  the 
books  of  Charles  Lamb;  a  ragged  remnant  of 
that  library  which  once  adorned  (its  nakedness 
more  attractive  than  the  gilding  of  Lewis  or  the 


tooling  of  Hayday)  the  walls  of  the  room  in  the 
Temple  where  Hazlitt,  Wordsworth,  Coleridge, 
and  other  choice  spirits  assembled,  and  where 
from  these  very  books  Elia  enforced  lagging 
conviction,  on  the  back  of  a  stammering  argu- 
ment, from  divines  and  poets,  wits  and  philoso- 
phers, whose  authority  washottobe  gainsayed. 
That  copy  of  Chaucer  in  black-letter  was  no 
ordinary  copy.  It  doubtless  had  its  history. 
Lamb  had  eyed  it  afar  off,  shedding  its  lumi- 
nous rays  of  the  spirit  out  of  the  reek  and  dingi- 
ness  of  a  London  stall,  hid  from  all  other  ob- 
servers, even  as  a  chiffonier  has  an  apprecia- 
tion of  an  invisible  silver  spoon  in  a  gutter. 
He  had  passed  it  and  repassed  it  on  his  daily 
walks,  his  conscience  growing  every  day  more 
tender  over  its  "unhoused"  condition.  He  felt 
for  it  as  he  would  feel  for  mendicity.  He  could 
bear  those  pangs  no  longer.  The  three  and  six- 
pence which  lurked  in  reluctant  pockets  must 
come  forth,  and  the  black-letter  victim  of  age 
and  destitution  be  borne  to  the  warm  shelves 
of  the  Temple,  its  constitution  hardened  by  the 
fumigation  of  tobacco,  its  dry,  worm-eaten 
leaves  moistened  with  ale  as  a  libation,  or  hon- 
ored with  the  ascending  incense  of  the  punch- 
bowl and  the  kettle.  There  should  it  have 
rested — but  rest  was  not  for  its  aged  weari- 
ness, which  had  long  since  exhibited  itself 
in  yawns  that  would  not  contract,  misanthrop- 
ic turnings  up  of  leaves  which  would  not 
be  laid,  and  a  protruding  back  bone  from 
which  the  calfskin  had  long  since  vanished. 
For  three  centuries  it  had  borne  these  dis- 
honors ;  in  the  third,  narrowly  escaping  being 
sold  by  the  pound,  to  be  consigned  to  American 
shores.  Verily,  old  Dan  Chaucer  must  have 
tingled  somewhere  in  his  ancient  veins  as  the 
warm-hearted  youth  and  fusty  old  connoisseurs 
13 


thronged  around  him  in  the  auction-room  in 
Broadway,  and  bid  for  the  honor  of  his  com- 
pany as  rival  families  outvie  each  other  in 
Anniversary  season  for  the  company  of  a  favor- 
ite saint  or  clergyman.  Old  Jeffrey  Chaucer, 
the  very  copy  of  which  Lamb  wrote  to  Ainsworth 
in  1823,  "I  have  not  a  black-letter  book  amongst 
mine,  old  Chaucer  excepted,"  was  knocked 
down  to  Burton,  probably  a  descendant  of  the 
anatomist,  for  I25  !  The  Hudibras,  with  the 
autograph  of  John  Lamb,  the  humorist's /aM^r, 
an  excellent  copy,  with  the  slight  exception 
that  the  covers  had  been  torn  off  and  the  illus- 
trations by  Hogarth  plucked  out,  went  off  for  a 
poor  $3.  A  couple  of  volumes  of  "Miscellany 
Letters "  of  the  seventeenth  century,  with  a 
memorandum  of  the  names  and  residences  of 
friends,  "Godwin,  44  Gower  Place,  Fenwick, 
Talfourd,  Moxon,"  etc.,  brought  $10.50.  One 
of  the  "Old  Plays"  was  purchased  by  Dr. 
Cogswell  for  $8 — may  it  rest  at  last  in  the  Astor 
Library  !  The  "  Relation  of  the  Fearfull  Es- 
tate of  Francis  Spira,"  with  the  note  in  the 
clerkly  hand  of  Elia — "  This  book  was  written 
by  one  Springer,  a  lawyer,"  decorates,  if  such 
a  term  can  be  applied  to  calfskin  so  far  gone, 
the  shelves  of  our  own  library.  If  our  readers 
hold  on  to  us,  we  may  some  day  tell  what  the 
fearful  estate  of  Francis  Spira  was.  But  the 
Coryphaeus  of  the  collection  was  the  stark  folio 
of  Drayton,  "  Wars,"  "  Heroical  Epistles,"  the 
grimness  and  stateliness  of  which  Lamb  had 
relieved  by  copying  the  author's  love  songs 
on  the  blank  spaces — for  example,  this  pretty 
despair  of  a  fond  lover  :  * — 


*  That  sold,  by  $5  bids,  for  $28.  There  were  eighteen 
lots  of  these  choice  volumes,  and  the  price  for  which  the 
whole  was  sold  was  $122. 


TO  HIS  COY  LOVE. 
I. 
I  pray  thee,  leave,  love  me  no  more, 

Call  home  the  heart  you  gave  me, 
I  but  in  vain  that  Saint  adore. 

That  can,  but  will  not  save  me : 
These  poor  half  kisses  kill  me  quite ; 

Was  ever  man  thus  served. 
Amidst  an  ocean  of  delight 

For  pleasure  to  be  sterved  ? 
II. 
Shew  me  no  more  those  snowy  breasts, 

With  azure  riverets  blanched, 
Where  whilst  mine  eye  with  plenty  feasts, 

Yet  is  my  thirst  not  stanched. 
O  Tantalus,  thy  pains  ne'er  tell, 

By  me  thou  art  prevented  ; 
'Tis  nothing  to  be  plagued  in  hell. 

But  thus  in  heaven  tormented. 
III. 
Clip  me  no  more  in  those  dear  arms. 

Nor  thy  life's  comfort  call  me  ; 
O,  these  are  but  too  powerful  charms, 

And  do  but  more  enthrall  me,— 
But  see  how  patient  I  am  grown, 

In  all  tliis  coyle  about  thee  ; 
Come,  nice  Thing,  let  this  heart  alone ; 

I  cannot  live  without  thee. 

Below  is  a  list  of  the  books  sold,  with  the 
numbers  they  bore  in  the  sales  catalogue,  the 
prices  at  which  they  were  sold,  and  the  names  of 
the  buyers  and  their  present  owners,  so  far  as 
known  : 
{}>^^)  Art  of  Living.     %i.     Thompson. 

(360)  Cities  Great  Concern.     $1.75.     Wood. 

(361)  Chaucer.     $25.     William  Burton. 

At  the  Burton  sale  this  volume  was  bought  by 
Edward  A.  Crowninshield  of  Boston.  When  the 
Crowninshield  library  was  sold  en  bloc,  in  1859,  to 
Henry  Stevens,  Charles  W.  Frederickson  bought  the 
volume  from  Stevens. 

(362)  Dennis's  Original  Letters.     $3.      William 
Burton. 


(363)  Drayton's  Works.  $28.  George  Liver- 
more. 

(364)  Hudibras.     $3.     Loder. 

(365)  Hymens  Prceludia.     $4.     Edward  Smith. 
{-i^id)  Minor  Poets,     $2.25.     Astor  Library. 
(367)  Miscellany  Letters.     $5.25.     Mrs.  Ives. 
{2,^^)  Minor  Poets — Vanbrugh,  tic.     $8.     Astor 

Library. 
{2>(ioi)  Old  Plays— Nat  Lee,  etc.     $6.     George  H. 
Moore. 

(370)  Old  Plays— Wycherley,  etc.  $5.50.  John 
Austin  Stevens,  Jr. 

(371)  Poetical  Tracts.     $3.50.     Meade. 

(372)  Poetical  Tracts — Poems  by  Charles  Lloyd. 
$6.50.     Charles  Eliot  Norton,  of  Cambridge. 

{:im)  Philips' s  Poems.     $4.50.     Coggill. 

(374)  Relation  of  the  Fearful  Estate  of  Francis 
Spira.     $2.     George  L.  Duyckinck. 

(375)  Tracts — 11  Curious  tracts.  $2.25.  Sey- 
mour. 

(376)  Tracts — Descriptive  catalogue  of  the  pict- 
ures of  Blake,  e\.c.     $4.25.     Campbell. 

The  collection  of  Charles  W.  Frederickson, 
sold  by  Bangs  &  Co.,  of  New  York  City,  May 
24-28,  contained  the  following  book  that  was 
also  once  owned  by  Charles  Lamb: 

Collier,  J.  Payne.  The  Poetical  Decameron  ; 
or,  Ten  Conversations  on  English  Poets  and 
Poetry.  2  vols.  Crown  8vo,  half  morocco, 
gilt  tops,  uncut.     London,  1820. 

Charles  Lamb's  copy.  Presentation  copy  from  the 
author  to  Charles  Lamb  ;  also,  Lamb's  autograph. 

Bought  at  the  sale  of  Charles  W.  Frederickson's  li- 
brary, by  Hodge,  for  $22.50. 

16 


One  Hundred  Copies  of  this  pamphlet 

were  printed  for  The  Dibdin  Club, 

by  the  Kay  Printing  House, 

66  and  68  Centre  Street, 

New  York  City. 


3 

This  copy  is  No ™- 


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